Principles of Oral and Listening foreign language lessons in China. • Knowledge vs. Skills In my preceding practice in China I was daily reminded that the principle duty was to impart ‘knowledge’. This word became a mantra, and the dominant causation behind pedagogical decisions. The task was the supply information to the students, and for them to remember it. I argued that knowing something is different from being able to do it. I provided endless examples: reading every book ever written about Einstein would not make you a great physicist, neither would listening to a thousand hours of classical piano suddenly transform the student into a pianist. In the same way, memorizing great big lists of vocabulary might help somewhat in the limited, multiple-choice world of the exam room, but it was next to useless when it came to expressing yourself in English, or understanding what was being said. Stripped of context, vocabulary became a time-sink with little educational value; the students didn’t know where knowledge ended and skills began. (Example with a hunter, skill of hunting and a gun). • Structure There is a great difference, between two points: “Learn language” and “Acquire language”. What’s the crucial thing to acquire any skill? Practice. Classic lesson structure: - Theory - Guided practice. - Independent practice. • Importance of timely review. As lesson content as acquired, need to advance to the next topic, but it’s very important to come back and review it later to refresh. It’s trivial, but too important to omit this point. Sometimes teachers neglect it and don’t timely review what is learned, as a result of which students forget it. • Selecting proper textbooks with actual topics and proper content presentation. Nowadays, any school can afford modern actual textbooks, issued by reputable publisher of English speaking country and select a textbook, best matching learning goal, students’ level, study group size and other parameters. • Visualization. Modern culture is rapidly turning from text to video culture. Books, text training aids are being replaced by pictures and videos. We, educators, have to be flexible and open to changes to stay on track and implement new practice and materials. To remain a modern student stay focused we should use maximum of visualization, illustrating learning materials with pictures and video, as bright and attractive as possible. •